Data communication concepts, such as protocol stacks, are increasingly being used to achieve communication across wireless communication systems. However, data communications concepts were developed to achieve communication across computer networks, such as local area networks (LAN), wide area networks (WAN), etc., which is different than achieving communication across wireless communication systems. In computer networks, data communication involves encapsulating data with a first protocol stack at a source host computer such that the data may be transmitted to a main circuit board (or a networking hardware device, such as the well-known Ethernet card, from which the data can be retrieved into the main circuit board) in a destination host computer where the encapsulated data is un-encapsulated with a second protocol stack and routed to a software process on the main circuit board. To transmit the data to a software process on the main circuit board, some control information regarding the software process to which the data is to be sent is required. The first protocol stack adds such control information to the data in the encapsulation process. Specifically, the control information being added includes a port number, which is an indication of the software process on the main circuit board in the destination host computer to which the data belongs (or is to be sent).
By contrast, in wireless communication systems, data communication involves encapsulating data with a first protocol stack at a source node and transmitting the encapsulated data to a main circuit board in a destination node where the encapsulated data is un-encapsulated with a second protocol stack and routed to a software process on a component connected to the main circuit board via an external bus. Thus, unlike computer networks, data communication in wireless communication systems involves routing the data to a software process that is not on the main circuit board. To route the data from the main circuit board to a software process on a component, the address of the component is required.
Since data communication concepts were developed for computer networks, typical industry standard protocol stacks, such as the well-known Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) suite, assumed all data were to be transmitted to a software process on a main circuit board and, thus, were not developed to add sufficient control information that could address a component. A simple solution would be to redevelop the protocol stack such that the protocol stack can add such sufficient control information. However, such a solution is undesirable because it would require customization of an industry standard which is currently being used in many wireless communication systems. Accordingly, there exist a need to add sufficient control information that could address a component using typical industry standard protocol stacks which would allow data to be transmitted to a component in a wireless communication system.